America is doing something right, but there are so many variables that go into that statistic that you cant single out something like socialized healthcare.  Or even if healthcare has the same relationship with the statistic as you would think.  Are sick people are healthy enough to work worse than sick people who are unable to work and aren't counted in the statistic?  I know America has a program that trains and helps senior citizens find office work, but I would imagine the statistic would be better off if those people stayed unemployed.

Fom the article: "Seven years ago, French workers produced over a dollar more on average than their American counterparts. The country led the U.S. in hourly productivity from 1994 to 2003."

I have a hard time imagining what America or France recently changed that would account for that, which leads me to think this is one of those difficult to explain social qualities and not a simple to understand principle.

If you read the paragraph after you'd have known what's changed.

The fact that you claim one thing... then when evidence points to the contrary, you claim the statistics have too many variables certaintly says something though.

Thank you for proving my real point.

I didn't use wikipedia, if you'll notice my figure is different than wikipedia's, so you still haven't shown me that my figure is only metropolitan, or that the US has higher life expectancy.

Also the figures you are listing are for college graduates, not those advanced degrees, my point was about advanced degrees, even in the US you'll find college grads without jobs, currently college grads, between the ages of 20-24 have 7.7% unemployment in the US, but a college grad is not a doctorate or an MD.  So you still haven't shown that my point was wrong about having advanced degrees and being able to find a job.

Ah finally you show something to back up one of your claims, ok so according to BBC its 9.2 for those of french origin and 14% for those who are immigrants, ok, i'll grant you its an issue you're right on that.  Ok, so so far you've supported one of your arguments, that those who are immigrants to france are worse off than those who are not immigrants, now, can you link that to the social safety nets?  Because just saying its a racial issue is not enough to say that its because of the safety nets.

So i'm still waiting on that extra information that will prove your point about the flaws of social nets, because so far you've only shown that the racial problem is such that it affects even in spite of education, fair enough, but that alone is not an indictment of the nets.

7.7% unemployment in the US.  Note the 20+% uenmployment in france for people between 20-25

As for advanced degrees?  Where is your proof?  Show how more people in france have advanced degrees, and more poor people in france have advanced degrees.

Cause... i'm doubting that.  I mean in the US if you are going for a graduate degree and are paying for it yoruself... your doing something wrong.

It's all been proven really.  You just want to ignore it because it goes against your core beliefs. 

It's better to not have a particular core belief and just believe in what ends up working better like I do. 

Aferall as everyone on this forum knows, i support government saftey nets. 

The difference is though, i recognize that a poorly done saftey net like France is worse then none at all.

New kinds of nets and ideas need to be created, but instead people cling to what exists and pretends it works because of ideological reasons as it's easier to repackage somethign old then come up with something new.

Both the US and France's systems are wrong.  France's system however has more problems, and is also more resistant to change.

You hinted that socialized healthcare had something to do with it when that wasnt entirely the case.  I went on to say that there are so many variables that you cant pin it down on one thing, then you said oh yes you can the article says what changed, even though it had nothing do with socialized healthcare.

Congratulations, you defeated yourself in an argument.

Not at all.  They claimed what changed was setting up the companies to be more competitive with each other.  Socialized healthcare, and other saftey nets prevent French buisnesses from doing this since you can't cut people like crazy due to the ridiculious amount of paperwork involved to make the system work.  Socialized nations buisnesses have problems like that.

My arguement was simply that the US has the most productive workers, so to claim that socialized healthcare makes workers more productive is obviously unfounded.

Of which is something you couldn't really argue.

If you aren't going by productivity why do you think socialized healthcare makes workers more productive? 

What statistic are you using to claim this?  You have none.

France had those same safety nets and socialized healthcare in 2000 when they were more productive that the United States.

The article said that the United States is more organized and competitive now.  I have no reason to doubt that, but what did the United States and France change that made this so.

Socialized healthcare makes people more productive because more people are covered and healthy people are more productive.

The 7.7 are for college grads in the US, the 205 you keep showing is for all youth, being between the ages of 20 and 25 doesn't mean you have a degree,in fact you showed that college grads in france as a whole is 5%, smaller than the US's 7.7%

 I never said more people have advanced degrees in France, they wouldn't since france has a much smaller population, 65 million vs. 310 million, so US will have more people with advanced degrees just because of it being five times more populous, I said if you have an advanced degree you will be able to find a job.

So far all you're proving is you can't read

So wheres the evidence that the safety nets are a failure?

Also on the argument of people working less hard, ok, all that shows is that there's a more laid back atmosphere in other countries and people don't work as hard as in the US.

Which still defeats your point.

You have no basis for your healthcare arguement.

I'm not claiming anything outside the fact that you may be wrong because you aren't actually basing your belief on anything.

Healthy people are more productive.